Hooksexup @ SXSW

Final Post: And the Winner Is . . .
3/22/2005 10:53:47 PM

Here are my own personal SXSW awards. Sorry that I didn't put them up sooner. My body and mind went to mush for a couple days. Check out clips of all the bands on the SXSW website. Till next year . . .

Best Over-Hyped Band

Bloc Party

Bloc Party. Maybe five shows in three days was overkill, but they were working their asses off—and getting better with every show. A little sloppy at the start of the festival, by their final show at the Vice/Kemado party on Saturday, they’d proven themselves the disaffected, multicultural heirs to Franz Ferdinand’s dance rock revival. Plus, the drummer—with no shirt, a gold chain, and fan-blown hair—looks like his very own spectacled White Snake video.

Best Band I’d Never Heard About

The Magic Numbers. Like The Mamas and The Papas, these two sets of brothers and sisters from London sing sweet harmonies that feel like summer. Just signed to Heavenly Records, they don’t even have a single out. If you’re in Europe, catch them on tour with Doves.

It's unanimous! That guy loves in blue loves The Magic Nunmbers, too!

Best Band I’d Never Heard About, Runners-up:

Of Montreal, who are actually from Athens, GA. Wacky, irrepressibly happy electronica, kind of like a mixture of The Avalanches and The Rapture on ecstasy. New album out on April 12.

And Bonk. After my lovely encounter with Leif, I listened to their CD and it rocks: Sirens, thrashing chords, and unison chanting that sounds like, “I want to be in Brooklyn,” though I’m sure that’s wrong. Imagine that the Beastie Boys had grown up in Norway on a diet of Nirvana and ‘shrooms. Leif, seriously, look me up in New York.

Best Surprise

Feist of Broken Social Scene showing up to lend her inimitably fragile touch to the smooth harmonies of the Kings of Convenience. Great, great show.

Biggest Disappointment

Besides the New York Dolls? Coming off my Futureheads concert high and listening to their album again. Who's the genius who buried "Hounds of Love" two songs from the end?

Best Performance by a New York Band

Diamond Nights

Diamond Nights (Kemado Records), who look poised to break on the strength of their Billy Idol swagger—not a major label push. (Yes, Bravery, I’m talking to you.) But remember that you heard it here first.

Most Curious Trend (thanks, Dan)
Punk was born out of boredom, but what does it mean when punk-influenced bands start announcing, “This is a song about boredom,” which The Futureheads, Bloc Party, and Stars all did? If you were aware enough of your boredom to realize you could capitalize on it to write song, then doesn’t that belie an ambition that’s the opposite of punk?

Most Ubiquitous

Louis XIV, who, when they weren't making out with my newly acquired SXSW friends, were making their indelibly grating presence known even as we waited and waited in line to see the Kings of Convenience.

That girl in front, also not pleased with another Louis XIV sighting

My Secret Boyfriend

Erland of the Kings of Convenience, because of the funny, finger-snapping, tall-man dance he did around the stage and the time he yelled, in mock frustration, “Come on! Stop being so fucking boring!” when the crowd wasn’t singing loud enough. And because, as I’ve said before, I love me a man in glasses.

Okay, but I'd take him, too. Can you tell I'm obsessed?

Your Secret Boyfriend

This guy. He wore these tight, tight, vertically-striped black and white pants that made him look like he was on stilts. Plus he was rude to me and everyone I know, so he’s all yours.

Best SXSW Resource

Tie between Oh My Rockness and The Austin Chronicle (see links at right), both invaluable but incomplete. Oh My Rockness had lists of all the day shows and private parties and provided maps, but didn’t have set times or enough band descriptions. The Chronicle had great, opinionated musical descriptions, but was so exhaustive it felt easier to pick bands at random than read all the way through and make an informed decision.

Favorite People

Shimon and all the folks at French House. Thanks for letting me stay with you.

P.S. Apologies to the three out of five members of Turzi whose names I misspelled throught the week (I've gone back and corrected them).

Best Shows I Didn’t See

U.S.E., or United State of Electronica, an ‘80s dance party, courtesy of Arye

Billy Idol. The dude sitting behind me on plane said he was “ unreal kinds of good”

Dead Meadow, deeply committed stoners from DC, from The End of the World guys

LCD Soundsystem, no one I know made it there (same night as Queens of the Stone Age), but I just have a feeling. Plus, they played with Hot Chip and M.I.A., always a good sign.

Worst Band Name

The Blueskins. They play the blues. Shocker, I know.

Oh, there were so many. I’m not sure which is worse, lame lack of effort, like SOUND Team or The Blueskins (for, yes, kids who play the blues); lame attempts to reference where you’re from, like Dung Beatles (Texas), Southern Bitch (Georgia), and Alabama Thunderpussy (uh, from Virginia—though I kind of like that one); or creativity gone awry. Since last year’s prize for Best Band Name went to I Love You But I’ve Chosen Darkness, creativity has to take the fall this year. It was a close one, with stiff competition from The Robot Ate Me and Jesus Christ Superfly, but Hitler Hated The Moon, congratulations! The prize is yours.

Best Party

Best DJ ever, Steve Aoki. That crazy guy in the corner is my friend Arye.

In a landslide, the Vice/Kemado Records party on Saturday night, the last day of the festival. Held on an artists’ commune called the Rhizome Collective that by day was overrun with wild turkeys, it was the (literally) other-side-of-the-tracks antithesis to 6th Streets interminable lines, herd-like crowds, and bars so dark and packed it could take fifteen minutes to find your friends. Maybe it was the relief of not having to fight our way into another show, or the excitement of hanging out in a big, brightly-lit outdoor space where we could actually hear each other talk, but the night felt gloriously free, like the last day of school.

The Go! Team's super-spunky singer

I’ll admit that standing around with the early, almost universally mullet-headed crowd and, randomly, Elijah Wood was a bit intimidating, but pretty soon I ran into every single person I knew at South by—including one guy I knew from last year who when I asked how his year had been immediately said, “I met my girlfriend,” as if I was still harboring my (admittedly obvious) crush from a year ago. (A new buddy of mine, a seven-year South by vet, was having a similar buzz kill. Looking around, she said, “I can spot at least seven guys over there I’ve made out with,” before going off to make out with someone else.) Luckily, there were plenty of others to choose from—at one point I’d met so many tall, exceedingly friendly blonde musicians I couldn’t tell one from the next. And that was just in the dirt lot by the gate.

Bloc Party smashed their drum kit at the end of their set

When we weren’t inside a warehouse catching killer sets from New York up-and-comers like Diamond Nights and Lansing-Dreiden, and the most in-demand bands of the festival, Bloc Party and The Go! Team, we were outside in a tree-filled courtyard dancing with my new favorite DJ (Steve Aoki, head of L.A.’s Dim Mak Records, with my least favorite DJ name, Kid Millionaire), who also happened to be the happiest person in the crowd.

I spotted go-going on the speakers and boy-girl-boy and boy-boy-boy sandwiches and more than a few lesbian couples in hot embrace. The only bummers: One, the uber Vice magazine move of only buying PBR and Sparks (though they were free, so I can’t complain too much), two, the massive miscalculation of renting only three Porta-potties (all the publicists were laughing their asses off in the parking lot), and three, a line so long some of my friends couldn’t get it (but according to them, neither could James Iha. When he tried to pull rank, the guy at the gate barked, “Back of the line!”). Overall, A++.

The Go! Team's hipster pep rally

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New York: Final Quiz Answers Revealed!!! (See March 20 post)
3/22/2005 3:18:13 PM

Lovely Krissy of New York is a so-called street merchandizer, hired to go to shows and be seen wearing Levis and Urban Outfitters clothes. And hot she did look. Even I asked her to wear my clothes for me.

Evan Lawrence plays keyboard in a very good Austin mod dance band called This Microwave World.

Evan in action

And here's one last funny Austinite I met, at Daniel Johnston's book store show. He has a secret identity. Can you guess what it is? Answer at bottom of photo.

Meet El Cangrejo, Ambassador de Borrachos (The Crab, Ambassador of Drunks), a Mexican wrestling entertainer who goes to parties and tries not to start fights. His motto is, "Don't make me not wrestle you!" No, seriously. I love Austin.

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